Twice Bitten ~ COMPLETED

Chapter 5 ~ Hermione Gets Onboard

Snape sensed Hermione running across the grounds. Damn it. Didn’t any of them listen? Ah well, he had hoped to give her a less dramatic introduction to the situation, but if anything, Ron’s turning would drive the importance of her assistance home in an unmistakable manner.

Ron continued to scream, Harry and Snape watching him, Harry’s pallor even more pale. Ron was in so much pain. Panting Hermione ran up, holding her lit wand out in front of her, her eyes wide as she looked at Ron flailing about.

“What’s wrong with him? Why aren’t you trying to help him?” she screamed at Harry and Snape, attempting to run over to the wizard seizuring on the ground.

Snape caught her by one arm and she struggled to break away from him.

”Let me go you bastard! I know you had something to do with this!” Hermione yelled at the Potions master, totally distraught.

”You will stand here and be quiet, Miss Granger,” Snape said to her evenly, pulling her back a little distance.

Suddenly, Hermione calmed. She knew she shouldn’t, but was compelled to. She stood there and relaxed, looking up at the wizard, then back at Ron.

Ron suddenly fell still, lying on his back, his head flopped to one side.

He wasn’t breathing.

”Ron! Oh my gods, is he dead?” Hermione said, trembling as she tried to move forward but couldn’t.

Snape didn’t say anything as Harry walked up to Ron and bent over him.

“I advise you to step away, Mr. Potter,” Snape said.

Harry obeyed him and just in time too.

Hermione let out a gasp as Ron rose straight off the ground into a standing position, not using his limbs or anything to assist him. It looked like something had stood him up and the effect was frightening. His eyes opened and he looked about wildly for a moment. His blue eyes were black now.

“Ron?” Hermione said.

Ron’s eyes shifted toward Hermione and he tensed.

Snape was ready.

”Ron?” Hermione said, finding she could move again. She took a tentative step toward the wizard.

Suddenly, Ron bared his teeth, showing Hermione a sharp set of fangs before he launched himself at her with a snarl. Hermione screamed and tried to run, tripping over her own feet in her terror and falling to the ground. She closed her eyes, expecting Ron to leap on top of her.

Snape zipped in front of Hermione instantly, blocking Ron’s access. The wizard stopped in front of Snape, hissing horribly but not attempting to push past him. He instinctively knew that wouldn’t be wise to do.

Hermione opened her eyes and saw Professor Snape standing in front of her. She stood up and peered around him. Ron snarled at her savagely, sounding as if he wanted to tear her apart.

Snape yanked up his sleeve and offered his wrist to Ron.

”Drink,” he commanded.

Ron’s dark eyes looked at the pulsing blue veins beneath the wizard’s pale skin then grabbed Snape’s arm and plunged his fangs into his flesh without hesitation, Snape hissing from the initial pain before the euphoria settled on him again.

Hermione watched, both fascinated and repulse as Ron drank, his eyes half-lidded with pleasure as he received what he needed. Presently, Snape pulled his wrist away. Ron straightened, then blinked at Snape, looking a bit green beneath his paleness.

”Oh gods. I sucked on Snape,” he said, rubbing his tongue against the roof of his mouth as if trying to scrape away the taste.

Snape scowled at him.

“Ron, are you all right?” Harry asked, walking up to him.

Ron turned and stared at Harry for a moment in disbelief.

”Am I all right? Hell no, I’m not all right you bloody sod! You bit me and turned me into a blinking vampire!” Ron yelled at him, then jumped on Harry, attempting to beat him senseless.

Snape watched the ensuing brawl with amusement as Hermione yelled at him to stop them, the two wizards snarling, punching, wrestling and biting at each other, rolling around the ground.

“Make them stop, Professor!” Hermione screamed at him. “They’re going to kill each other!”

Snape looked at Hermione for a moment, and once again she felt strangely drawn to him.

“I highly doubt that, Miss Granger. However . . .” he said, looking back at the brawling pair, “Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley, stop fighting.”

Immediately the two vampires broke apart and stood up, glaring at each other but unable to continue. Snape arched an eyebrow. That had been quite a bit of compliance. Could he control these two? Apparently so.

He smirked evilly. That would keep things interesting.

“Now what’s going on here?” Hermione demanded, “Why are Harry and Ron vampires?”

“Mr. Potter is a vampire because I turned him,” Snape said to the witch in explanation, “And Mr. Weasley is a vampire because Mr. Potter couldn’t keep his fangs to himself. He would have died if I didn’t save him.”

”You call this saving me?” Ron snapped at the wizard.

”Possibly,” Snape replied, “Providing there is a way to make us mortal again. Otherwise our only options will be eternity as bloodsuckers or taking our own half-lives. I for one will choose the second option. I will not exist this way. We need your help, Miss Granger.”

Hermione looked up at the wizard. What was it about him that made her want to please him?

”I’ll help you,” Hermione said dreamily, without even asking what the hell she needed to do.

Snape studied her. This was extremely out of character for the bright witch. Normally, she’d be firing off questions and throwing a tantrum about him turning Harry into a vampire. But no. She was being quite cooperative. Too much so.

Maybe . . . maybe he could control her too.

”Miss Granger, do a pirouette for me,” Snape said to her silkily.

Hermione spun as gracefully as she could for the vampire, stopping and looking up at him.

”Hey!” Harry said, scowling.

”Now hop like a bunny,” Snape said to the witch, who put her hands together like little forepaws, her lit wand between them and began to hop about.

“Hermione, stop it!” Ron called to her.

Hermione hesitated a moment, then looked at Snape and began hopping again as the wizard grinned nastily.

“You leave her alone you git!” Harry snarled, walking toward Snape with his fists clenched. Ron fell in step beside him.

Snape arched an eyebrow at the both of them as Hermione continued hopping about, panting a little now.

”What is this? An uprising?” Snape purred at them, then snarled, “Stay where you are!”

Both Harry and Ron stopped, frowning blackly.

”He’s controlling us,” Harry said to Ron, whose black eyes rested on Snape hatefully.

”Bastard,” Ron hissed.

“You can stop, Miss Granger, and you won’t be angry about what I made you do,” Snape said to the witch. “Now come over here.”

Still panting, Hermione obediently walked up to Snape and stood beside him as the wizard looked at the stricken wizards with narrowed eyes.

”I was simply testing the limits of my control,“ Snape said to them. “If I had known I could have compelled Miss Granger to do my bidding, I wouldn’t have saddled myself with you, Mr. Potter, nor consequentially become stuck with you as well, Mr. Weasley. As it stands, we have to make the best of our situation until Miss Granger can sort it out for us. So I am going to release you two. But I warn you, if you two idiots get on my nerves, you’ll both spend the rest of your time with me standing in opposite corners in the sub-dungeons, facing the walls for the duration. Am I understood?”

Both Ron and Harry nodded sullenly. Damn it. The Professor had them by the fangs.

”You’re free,” he said to them. Both wizards were able to move again.

“Now, everyone back to the castle. Do not allow yourselves to be seen if anyone is about. Miss Granger and I will meet you in the subdungeons,” Snape said, swooping Hermione up into his arms and streaking away with her.

”Hey! He took Hermione!” Ron cried, taking off at a run after the wizard, but Snape was totally gone. Ron stopped and looked at Harry.

“Where’d he go?” he asked the wizard who hurried up to him.

”To the subdungeons,” Harry said.

Ron scowled.

”I know that, but where is he now? How’d he move so fast?” Ron wanted to know.

”He’s faster than we are,” Harry said, “I think Snape can do things we can’t because he created us.”

”Well, that stinks,” Ron griped, “Even dead, he’s still over us. Damn it.”

“That’s Undead, Ron,” Harry corrected him, “And he’s trying to find a way to make us human again.”

”I was already human,” Ron snapped at him, “until someone BIT me.”

”I’m sorry, Ron. I really am,” Harry said apologetically, “But when you want blood, you can’t think. I didn’t even know who you were.”

The two walked across the grounds in silence for several minutes. Ron suddenly had a thought and not a pleasant one.

”You know, it seems Snape can make Hermione do anything he wants,” Ron said to Harry.

”Yeah, it does,” Harry agreed.

The two wizards looked at each other, the lurid possibilities of what Snape could be doing right now to Hermione hitting them like a ton of rock cakes. They both took off toward the castle simultaneously, dashing across the grounds at top speed.

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Hermione held on to Snape breathlessly as the world flashed past her, a huge blur. He stopped four times. The first to Disillusion them, the second to open the doors to the castle, the third to tap the bricks and the fourth time to set her down in his chambers. It took them less than a minute to reach their destination. Hermione looked at all the books and parchments piled on the table. She walked over to them, Snape watching her thoughtfully.

While carrying the witch to the castle, he was very aware of Hermione’s warmth, the blood coursing through her body, the delicate inhalation exhalation of breath, the tiny gurglings and rumblings of her organs as they worked in tangent to maintain her frail but precious life.

Life as precious? This was a new concept for the Professor. There had only been one precious existence in his experience and that had been snuffed out years ago by Voldemort. All other lives beyond that one had been expendable.

Perhaps it was because he was no longer part of that mortal coil that the wizard was so aware of what a gift it was, one taken for granted. The ability to partake of life, live off the earth, move freely in the sunshine. The very concepts that would have made him gag only a week before were now meaningful and understandable.

Hermione radiated that which was beyond him now. Life. It was alluring, compelling, something he desired. However, the way it translated was a feeling of lust. A desire to couple with the witch, feel her around him and make her life his own vicariously.

Snape realized he wouldn’t be averse to fucking Miss Granger. Not one bit. It was a shocking thing to admit to himself, but he believed his transformation had much to do with it. He was a male vampire and Hermione was a female human in his vicinity. Food. He had never once thought about touching the young witch before now and to date had only turned males. Maybe the process of turning someone of the opposite sex was different. When Lilutu turned him, it was at the completion of the sex act. Perhaps, that was how this species of vampire operated. Sort of like Incubi, or sex demons. It was an interesting thought, but he couldn’t turn Hermione. He needed her mortal.

Still, there could be room for . . . exploration. After she helped him find answers that is.

Hermione looked at all the information lying on the table.

”What is this, Professor?” she asked the vampire, looking at a few of the parchments.

”Information concerning vampires, Miss Granger. A wealth of it. It is rather daunting, and . . . and I know you have an affinity for research, for sorting out what is necessary . . .I would like you to use your talents to help me . . . us . . . become mortal again,” he said to her a bit haltingly.

Hermione turned to him, her eyes narrowed.

”Professor, you turned Harry into a vampire so I’d help you, didn’t you?” she asked him directly.

Snape looked rather surprised. Was it that obvious?

”It is a possibility,” he replied.

”It’s more than a possibility, Professor. I have an idea how you operate. You felt you needed leverage for me to help you, so you turned Harry into a vampire thinking that while I might not help you, I’d definitely help him because he is my friend,” she said to him.

Snape didn’t say anything.

”I would have helped you if you came to me, Professor,” Hermione said softly, “You wouldn't have had to use extortion. I would have helped you because you deserve help after all you’ve done. Voldemort is gone now and you would be free to live a normal life like everyone else, except this has happened. I think it’s terribly unfair, knowing what I know about you. But I have to say at first, I believed you deserved to be killed, because of Dumbledore. I didn’t feel bad for you at all. Then Harry told me and Ron everything. But no one else knows yet. If you were to show your face in public, you’d be arrested . . . maybe even executed.”

“Is that supposed to be something new?” he asked the witch sarcastically.

“No. I was just stating facts,” Hermione said.

”Well you’ve enlightened my entire existence, Miss Granger, except you neglected to add I could be ‘staked’ or ‘decapitated’ as well,” he said curtly. “I believe those are the favored methods the Ministry uses to dispose of vampires.”

”Yes, that and tying them between two posts and letting them face the dawn,” Hermione said, a nasty little smirk on her face.

Snape didn’t see anything smirk-worthy in that statement.

”So, can you do anything with that?” he said, gesturing to the books and parchments.

Hermione looked at the pile.

”When there’s this much information, Professor, research has to be approached logically,” she said a bit loftily, “And that means rather than start with all of this, we need to start with you. To find out about your experience. Once I’ve compiled enough personal information, I’ll be able to move forward from there.”

”What do you need from me, Miss Granger?” Snape asked as Hermione began to tap her finger to her chin thoughtfully as she studied him.

”I need to know how you got this way, Professor. I saw you die in the Shrieking Shack. You died of a snakebite, not a vampire bite. I can’t understand how you are a vampire,” she said to him.

“I was bitten by a vampire when I was nineteen years old,” Snape said to the witch, “In a foreign country. I was looking for a rare herb at a site that was formerly part of Ancient Babylonia,” he said, watching as Hermione sat down, grabbed a piece of parchment and wrote down what he said.

“That’s south of Baghdad, isn’t it?” Hermione asked him as she wrote.

”Yes,” the wizard replied, a bit impressed.

"Why didn't you turn?" she asked him.

"I used a Bezoar. I thought I had been poisoned. I believed it cured me. Apparently, it didn't," the dark wizard said.

"It seems like it stopped the infection temporarily. Still, if you were drained, you should have died. Maybe the vampire didn't take that much blood. A Bezoar wouldn't help blood loss," Hermione said thoughtfully.

"No, the bite itself was extremely painful but the feeding didn't last long at all," the wizard agreed. "It seemed quite quick."

Hermione nodded and wrote this down. Maybe the Bezoar had made whatever turned humans into vampires dormant. It was something to consider.

“What did the vampire look like?” Hermione asked in a business-like manner.

Snape would never forget how beautiful Lilutu was, but didn’t feel he could describe her properly. When he didn’t respond, Hermione looked at him with a scowl.

”You do remember what it looked like, don’t you Professor?” she asked him.

”Of course I do. But I might miss some important detail in the telling of it,” he snapped back at her. “I have a solution. Wait here.”

Suddenly, the vampire was gone for about thirty seconds. Then he was back, holding a small Pensieve in his hand. He passed it to her.

”This is my memory of that night,” he said to her, then added with a smirk, “the ‘uncut’ version.”

Hermione was past the Age of Consent, so the Professor put everything in the Pensieve, feeling Hermione might catch something with her powers of observation that he wouldn’t have thought to tell her. Yes, there was sex involved, but she should be able to handle that.

Hermione blinked at the Pensieve. Uncut version? What did he mean by that?

She set the Pensieve on the table, then looked down into it, falling still as she was drawn in.

After a couple of minutes, she knew exactly what Professor Snape meant by ‘uncut.’

In his case, the term had two meanings.

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A/N: Thanks for reading.